[0:00] [Music] [0:54] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Good evening and welcome to the April 15th city council meeting. If you join me for a moment of silence and Pledge of Allegiance. [Music] [1:17] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** To the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Okay, um, Orlofsky, roll call please. **City Clerk Ann Orlofsky:** Michelle Volk? **Councilmember Michelle Volk:** Here. **City Clerk Ann Orlofsky:** Luke Hellier? **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Here. **City Clerk Ann Orlofsky:** John Bermel? **Councilmember John Bermel:** Here. **City Clerk Ann Orlofsky:** Dan Wolter? **Councilmember Dan Wolter:** Here. **City Clerk Ann Orlofsky:** Joshua Lee? **Councilmember Joshua Lee:** Here. [1:30] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Okay, now we'll move on to Citizens comments. This is an opportunity for anybody to address the council for up to three minutes on issues that are typically not on the agenda. Any citizens comments? I don't see any. Moving on to item number four, additional agenda information. Mr. Miller? [2:00] **City Administrator Justin Miller:** Nothing tonight, Mayor. [2:02] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Okie doke. To number five, donations to 360 Communities and The Open Door from Lakeville Liquors, and I'll turn it over to our Liquor Operations Director, Tana Walseth. [2:28] **Liquor Operations Director Tana Walseth:** Mayor and council members, thank you so much for having me tonight. So throughout the month of March, our liquor operations held its annual fundraiser to support our local food shelves, and today I'm thrilled to share with you the incredible impact of our efforts. Um, thanks to the generosity from our customers, we've raised a grand total of $34,714.96. Along with this monetary donation, customers also donated close to 300 lbs of food. This amount demonstrates our community's commitment to supporting those in need. Thank you all that contributed to this fundraiser. With these funds, we are honored and able to split this amount between the 360 Communities and The Open Door Pantry, two invaluable organizations in our community that work to combat hunger and provide support to individuals and families facing hardships in our community. We are privileged to have two representatives joining us tonight: Jeff Mortenson is the President and CEO of 360 Communities, and Stephanie Andrews is the Board President of The Open Door Pantry. So if either of you would like to say something, you can go ahead. [3:25] **Jeff Mortenson:** Yeah, good evening. Thank you very much for um, the support. I would love to say that the need is lessening, but as you all know, it is not. It's a wonderful thing, though, to see the support from Lakeville Liquors and the community here continue to rise to help support that need. So, um, good to see you all tonight and just really grateful and thankful for the heart that this community has. You have been a long-term supporter of 360 Communities and other great nonprofits, and it's just, it's truly a blessing for us and for the community. So thank you for that. [4:05] **Stephanie Andrews:** Want to echo all the things so much on behalf of the board, the staff at The Open Door. Um, as I think you know, we serve 15,000 people in Dakota County every month; 2,000 of those are in Lakeville. We do those through a couple of different programs, through our Mobile Lunchbox which um, gets to 11,000 students every summer. We probably will be serving more, which is both great and sad, and so happy that we're able to continue to provide that level of support. Also through the mobile pantry, we have five sites in Lakeville now. Recently added a senior center also where 50 seniors now have reliable access to good and healthy food. And so, really appreciate the work that you let us do here in Lakeville that you support, and um, we couldn't do it without you. So really appreciate it. We know that there are lots of different places you could send your support, and we're really grateful um, that you do it for The Open Door. So thank you so much. [5:18] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Great, thank you. Any comments from Council? John? [5:22] **Councilmember John Bermel:** Excuse me, I just, uh, thank you, Tana, for hosting this. But every time we do one of these, I'm just really amazed at the way our community steps up. So I'm really proud of our community right now and their support for a very real need. And, uh, so way to go, Lakeville, all of our community members. [5:44] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** I'll just add that to me, it's a testament to the reputation that you have in this community. So, um, the generosity is a reflection of the work that you're doing. And to bring in physical items—I don't know how many times I think about bringing items to the liquor store—so to me, that's also significant, too. But, uh, thank you both for your work and to the community, just extend my gratitude to the customers and the members of the Lakeville community. So thank you. Thanks, Tana. Thanks to both of you for partnerships. [6:21] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Okay, moving on to Item B, our Arbor Day Proclamation. And I'll turn it over to Zach Jorgensen, our City Forester, for a presentation. I think this might be your first time. Okay, did I miss your first one? Maybe. So we'll make it more exciting this time. Welcome. [6:33] **City Forester Zachary Jorgensen:** Thank you. Yeah, thanks for having me in tonight to introduce the Arbor Day Proclamation this year. Um, you know, we're excited obviously to celebrate Arbor Day. We're excited to dig in after this long winter and plant some trees this spring. We're excited to celebrate all the benefits trees provide to the community. So, uh, the Arbor Day Foundation has recognized Lakeville as a Tree City USA Community for 31 years. Uh, we're looking forward to making that 32 this year as well as adding a growth award. We're lining up to do that with all the great work that everyone in the city is doing with trees and management of the community forest. So we're excited for that as well. Um, to achieve Tree City USA, a city must proclaim an official Arbor Day celebration and hold an event that promotes the planting and care of trees as well as engages the community in the establishment and care of its forest—that's the official line. So this year we're doing that through two events. Uh, we're wrapping up our annual Arbor Day tree sale this Saturday with the tree distribution out of the Central Maintenance Facility with the Earth Day celebration. So people are going to show up this weekend to pick up their trees that they ordered. We did sell 255, which is a slight increase in trees this year. Uh, interestingly enough, the sale started mid-February and we sold that within two weeks this year. I think people were really excited with the warm weather to get outside. So that was great. Uh, we're introducing a bunch of new seedlings this year, things that are not generally available commercially in the local area, so some things that are climate-adaptive, exciting, and unique. So we're excited for those, and we're going to plant some of those in our parks as well just to see how they do. Uh, the second event is our Arbor Day tree planting event, which is a volunteer event. We're going to do that Wednesday, May 1st, in the evening this year, and we're going to have that over at Independence Park. And so those two events represent what we're doing for Arbor Day as part of our Tree City USA status. So with that, I'll turn it over for any questions or comments. [8:06] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Okay, I'll let Councilmember Volk read our Proclamation. [8:08] **Councilmember Michelle Volk:** All right, great. "Whereas Arbor Day provides an opportunity to celebrate the importance of trees and forests to our economy, culture, history, and future of the state; and whereas trees provide many benefits including clean air and water, shade and energy savings, wildlife habitat, recreational opportunities, wood products, and jobs, and increased property values while capturing and storing carbon from the atmosphere to offset greenhouse gas emissions; and whereas properly planting and caring for a diverse mix of trees makes community forests more resilient by minimizing the impacts of diseases, insects, and other stressors such as climate change while providing long-term community and environmental benefits; and whereas thoughtfully choosing, planting, watering, and caring for a diverse mix of trees now supports a resilient community into the future; and whereas the city of Lakeville will observe Arbor Day on Saturday, April 20th at the Arbor Day tree and shrub sale pickup event and will continue to celebrate Arbor month through forestry and parks planting collaborations and a volunteer planting project at Independence Park on Wednesday, May 1st. Therefore, the City Council of the city of Lakeville, in support of its community forest, proclaims Saturday, April 20th, 2024, is Arbor Day in the city of Lakeville." Proclaimed this 15th day of April, 2024, and it'll be signed by the Mayor. [10:13] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Very good. Thank you, sir. Thank you. All right, moving on to item C, our Fire Department quarterly report. And I'll turn it now over to Chief Meyer. Welcome. [10:33] **Fire Chief Mike Meyer:** Good evening, Mayor, council members. I'd like to present—it's actually our annual report and the first quarter report for 2024 combined. And I'll start with our mission statement: The Lakeville Fire Department is dedicated to serving the community through the protection of lives and property by providing public safety education and professional emergency response. Annual activities of the fire department obviously include responding to calls, so whether that's through the stations' response for Duty Crew, fire prevention which includes inspections, and then training in our schools and our businesses and throughout the community, department training, recruitment, and then community and public events. Looking at our emergency responses: so in 2023 we responded to 3,286 calls, and you can see as we go down the line there, the breakdown of those call types. Obviously, rescue EMS or Medicals are our main driver at 68%. Good intent calls, and then fires. I'll just draw your attention because it says 80; just to break those down, there were 26 building fires in 2023, and then they're broken down, as you can see, by vehicle, cooking fires, dryer, trash, and so on. The good intent calls: out of 503 of those, 388 are dispatched and canceled in route, and that just means that we weren't needed at that scene, whether it was a medical or some other type of incident that we were canceled either by the police department or the ambulance, for instance. Our drone team got very busy in 2023. So some of the responses that they do: water rescue, structure fires, search. It's a team made up of 10 people on the fire department. You can see a couple of the pictures. I think I've highlighted that the Lake Marion boat rescue from last year. The one at the top right corner: that was when we were requested to Eagan to help them with the Gopher Resource fire, which became a very good asset for them because we were able to monitor the crews that were on the roof, and that's also with the thermal cameras on the drone to watch the heat signatures coming off the roof. So if there's any danger areas, we could highlight for them before crews got themselves into trouble. Looking at our call comparison for over the past 10 years: so you can see obviously 2013 at 884 calls and then ending in 2023 with the 3,200 calls, and then how our population affects that. Obviously from roughly 2020 to current is where we saw our biggest spikes in call volume. 22 to 23 is more the average of what we see, that around that 5% to 10% increase per year. And then just breaking down those calls throughout the year between the stations: Station 1 and 2 are typically our two busier stations, and that's where our population density resides currently. Slight increase over Station 4 as far as numbers that we see there, but typically Station 4 is our secondary station or a backup station to either the duty crew or to the station that's responding to that primary call. And then one item that we continue to watch is just those simultaneous incidents. So throughout '23, there were 546 occurrences where we had more than two calls occurring; three times is 59; and then four calls occurring is nine times. Good example: like Saturday morning, we had five incidents going on at one time or within one hour, so we were running around quite a bit on Saturday morning. And then breaking down those calls as far as a Duty Crew response: out of just slightly under 1,800 calls a Duty Crew responded to, which in turn, 75% of that volume was for Medicals. And just so that you're aware as far as responsibility, when our crews are working on Duty Crew, beyond responding to calls, they are out doing pre-plan truck checks, temporary heat inspections, they do have training assignments, and then we do assign them to community events or conduct station tours for people. Looking at our response times and the 90th percentile: the top one is all incidents minus any canceled in route or EMS calls, and then the bottom chart shows just EMS only. The very top line on both of those, if you look at it, is the total response time—the PSAP to arrive. And what that means is from the time that our dispatch center answered the call till the time that the first unit arrived on scene. Blue indicates a station, and the gold or orange indicates the Duty Crew response, and they're fairly consistent between the two. Our Duty Crew is slightly faster when it looks at EMS calls. The other item that we do watch is that PSAP to alarm time, so that's our dispatch handling or when they process calls. Fires, typically there are fewer questions that they ask to dispatch versus an EMS call—they're asking more questions. So that's why you see that a little bit longer processing time. [15:43] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Chief, can I ask a quick question? I don't know if you have the data in here, but at some point can you give me the number of how many times—or maybe we don't track that—how we're interacting with ALF [Allina Health] at the same time? You know, are we there always first? I'm just curious if there's more data on that. [15:58] **Fire Chief Mike Meyer:** Yep, what we do track is kind of our arrival time versus their arrival time. I don't have that in front of me, but that's something that I can get to you. I will say, probably if I was to look at it, we're there prior to them 60% of the time. [16:11] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** That was my assumption. [16:12] **Fire Chief Mike Meyer:** Looking at fire prevention: so inspections. In 2023 we had roughly just under 1,300 inspections we completed, and they're just broken out by numbers that you see there. The one I'll draw your attention to is just the food trucks become more and more that we see every year, so we were just under 100 food truck inspections in 2023. 37 of those were strictly just for Pan-O-Prog; the other 57 are for food trucks that are coming in for events throughout the city. Food truck licenses, as I mentioned, just under a hundred on those, and just kind of the process that we go through: so all food trucks do apply to the fire department with an application, the stuff that's required, there is a fee, and if they are showing up at a private event, the property has to have written consent for them to be there. A good example that you see probably quite frequently is the ones that are at Fleet Farm; they do a very good job as coordinating that event for a weekend food truck event so that we're out there and prepared for that. Fire prevention visits—I won't go through the entire list there. The bottom one is where I'll draw your attention to: the fire extinguisher training. So we not only are we at the schools, but we're also in businesses. The one picture you can see kind of top left is our firefighters are at one of our elementary or middle schools teaching fire extinguisher training to our sixth-grade classes. So we do that every year in May, roughly, that we go into all three of our middle schools and promote fire extinguisher hands-on training with them. And then we get quite a few requests for businesses that want a fire safety visit as far as some education and then extinguisher training along with that. Department training: total combined hours for the department was over 9,000 hours of training that we completed. Every firefighter is required to attend one training per month, and those topics could include live burn training or live fire training, medical training which is EMR, auto extrication, agility testing, forced entry. We do a number of required online assignments which are most of our OSHA-mandated trainings that we have to accomplish. And then on the right side is kind of a breakdown of those medical training certifications. My actually my number is wrong on 57%; it should be 48%. 48% are EMR, 48% are EMT, which is up 34% compared to last year. So we have more—we're about 50/50 for EMTs on the department versus EMRs, and we have a few paramedics that work elsewhere that carry that certification. Some of the other trainings that we complete are Train the Trainer for active shooter or hostile events, and then our special response team training, so our drone and rescue swimmer teams are training. [19:01] **Councilmember Dan Wolter:** What's the difference between EMR and EMT? [19:04] **Fire Chief Mike Meyer:** EMR is Emergency Medical Responder and EMT is Emergency Medical Technician. So it's just a higher level. [19:12] **Councilmember Dan Wolter:** A higher level. Yep. [19:13] **Fire Chief Mike Meyer:** Wellness: stuff that we do, so mental and physical. Obviously physical, we have our fitness center up at Station 4 that continues to get quite a bit of use between police and fire departments. And then our mental health side of it—is we partnered with Abija on the backside, so they provide a lot of mental health and resilience training for our firefighters. They're not only just providing that training, but they're also incorporated into our training program, so they show up to station trainings; they're part of that piece. Our officer trainings: when we do have a critical incident, we notify them of the crews that were on scene, and then they actually reach out to them and make sure there's followup going on with those individuals if there's any troubles. With recruitment: it's a long timeline that we go through for recruitment. In '23 for '24 we actually advanced it a month, so applications were due for '24 today, just for a reference for that. But in '23 we hired three firefighters; all are assigned at Station 2. And you can see the process that it goes into for hiring those firefighters. And then a number we always look at is just our retention of firefighters. Looking over a 10-year span, again, our average continues to be about six years that we see a firefighter before they leave the department. And I'll just draw your attention: 22 and 23 was our largest numbers that we saw for retirees. A total of 12 firefighters retired between 22 and 23, and I will highlight six of those in 23, actually. Recognition: we held our annual banquet at Brackett's in February of this last year. We recognize Ross Woods as our Rookie of the Year and Aaron Ayer as our Firefighter of the Year. We also recognize the members that have accomplished 10 years, 15 years, or 20 years of service at that. As I mentioned, retirees: so we had six retirees in 2023. I won't go through all their names, but between the six of them, there's 140 plus years of service and experience that has left our department. Obviously, we just had Greg Staus here a little bit ago with 36 years, so he's probably one of our longest-standing firefighters that has retired from the department in my time. In December we held our badging ceremony for the class of 2021, so they had completed all their training certifications and their two-year probation, so they were recognized here with badging by their family members. And just a few other highlights for 2023: there was a lot of discussion, a lot of meetings around the transition to a hybrid department with full-time and paid-on-call firefighters. We submitted a SAFER Grant application; we were not successful in that in 2023. Council approved the hiring of our first six full-time firefighters that started in '24. We have completed and continue to have conversations around the fire station study, and we hired our second fire inspector in October. And then we have also completed our transition to a new record systems management called First Due. Community and public events: again, a long list of items that we're out and about at. The one I would draw your attention to—we don't have a picture up there—but is Shop with a Hero. With our partnership with the Public Safety Foundation and the school district, it is probably one of our most memorable and most attended events that we all enjoy and are part of. In the top right picture is a number of firefighters doing the 9/11 stair climb at Lifetime Fitness. Waffle breakfast at Pan-O-Prog: so this is the second year that firefighters served waffles, made waffles, did everything. We set another record, we were above 2022 with just over 2,100 plates or waffles served. And just know that's a full day for us as a department; we're there early in the morning and we're there until late at night. And this year we provided extra crews for a lot of downtown events, and our drone team was also a part of that, actively engaged in doing stuff for Pan-O-Prog as far as that's concerned. As I mentioned, the Public Safety Foundation is a great partner. Listed their events to the left side of the screen that they host throughout the year. Some of the things that they helped us fund as a fire department is Lucas devices that are used during a cardiac arrest, as well as the suction units that go with those. They also helped us purchase SEEK thermal camera sets, which is that bottom left picture you see. So each of our engines and ladders have an individual thermal camera that firefighters can wear when they're at a fire. Eight emergency vehicle plugs, which is that bottom right picture—and you're going to ask what is that for? It's for EV vehicles. So if they are involved in a vehicle accident, the plug actually goes into where you would charge the vehicle and it disables the car so it can't move while we're doing extrication or patient care. And the leg press is just another additional item that we've added at the fitness center. Jumping to the first quarter report for 2024. 806 calls to date so far. The biggest increase we saw was in January with 298 calls; February and March are pretty on course of what we see for numbers. And then a breakdown again of those incident types: 806, and then Medicals again remain at that 65-70% range. As far as building fires, there was eight building fires out of the 23 so far in 2024. Inspections: this is a little bit different than the previous slide, and this is a change with our change in our RMS system and then just changing how we're looking at that data and inputting that data in inspection. So we had 286 inspections. Annual inspections of things that you will see increase as we go through this '24 with our duty crew and such is the routine key box inspection—meaning that when we're at a business, whether that's for a call or we're there for an inspection, we're checking the key boxes that are provided so that we know we have access into that building. And then the routine other ones are just labeling our items to better define that for data that makes sense. And then some Department updates. As of the end of March, our class of '23 has completed all of their training and certifications and they are actually working Duty Crew shifts as we speak. We had nine firefighters complete their EMT certification which is provided through Allina. We continue with our station study and the remodel of Station 4 is in the final stages where we're basically going through the punch list. But a little bit more on that: our six full-time staff started March 4th and they are actually starting their first 24-hour shift as of 6:00 a.m. this morning. [26:41] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Today? [26:42] **Fire Chief Mike Meyer:** Today. [26:42] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Cool. [26:43] **Fire Chief Mike Meyer:** With that remodel, the doors were going in today; all the final major items were getting completed for them today. [26:49] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** So they did have doors when they... [26:50] **Fire Chief Mike Meyer:** They did get doors. [26:51] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Nice. [26:52] **Fire Chief Mike Meyer:** SAFER Grant was submitted on Wednesday, I believe it was, so we should hopefully hear results sometime probably June/July for the first round and it'll be later in the fall as we go through that. And then just as a final update, everything that occurred in Burnsville: we as a fire department—as one fire department that helped Burnsville—we provided about 500 plus hours of coverage for them. And that concludes my '23 annual report and '24 first quarter report, and I'll stand for any questions. [27:26] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Council questions? [27:31] **Councilmember John Bermel:** Just a question about the hiring. Um, how many applications do you get? Uh, because I think you—the data showed that you hired three, but how many people apply for... [27:44] **Fire Chief Mike Meyer:** Last year we were in the mid-20s. Uh, right now what we saw, cause our applications were actually due today for '24, we were right around 50. So there was a slight increase. And when we spoke to Apple Valley and Farmington fire departments, they also saw like kind of a spike or an increase in applications for their departments too. [28:13] **Councilmember John Bermel:** Good. [28:14] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Yeah, Josh. [28:15] **Councilmember Joshua Lee:** Well, impressive report; there's a lot of information, a lot of stuff happened in the last year and a quarter. Um, my only question was about—I was curious about the mutual aid to Eagan. When something gets called out like that, it seems like an abnormal mutual aid. So how does that get called out to us and who responds? Is that a truck, is that a pickup? [28:44] **Fire Chief Mike Meyer:** So it's broken down for us as a department, we call it alarm levels. To keep it—so like if us going to a structure fire within our own town or city, as far as Lakeville goes, it's a first alarm. When we start needing more assistance, it goes up to like a fifth alarm, which is our top of the line as far as drawing a lot of resources in, that makes sense. So I believe when Eagan requested us, we were the third alarm to bring crews in, because the crews prior to us were already being used or already, you know, at a point where they need to be replaced. The drone team was a special request because our crews got on scene and said, "You know, we could probably really use a drone, can we bring ours in to assist with that?" [29:33] **Councilmember Joshua Lee:** Gotcha. So is that a drone in a rig, or did you bring a vehicle up there or... [29:39] **Fire Chief Mike Meyer:** Typically, yep, we'll move it into like a pickup truck or a staff vehicle. What we did after that is we took our—we have an inspection trailer and fire investigation trailer, and we've modified that and actually the drones are in there with their own power source and monitors and so on. So we've really built that upward; now we just bring a trailer with the drones and monitors so that people can stand at the back and watch what the drone is seeing. [29:49] **Councilmember Joshua Lee:** Great. [29:50] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Thanks. Thank you, Chief. Thank you. Um, moving on to item six, the consent agenda. Any items you wanted to highlight, Mr. Miller? [30:00] **City Administrator Justin Miller:** Thank you, Mayor and Council. Two items tonight. Item 6D is a resolution accepting the donations from the liquor stores tonight, just a formal recognition again; we thank all of our customers for that. And then item 6M is an agreement with MOM Brands for some site improvements to their site. I bring this up just as a recognition of their expansion and continued investment in Lakeville, and we appreciate that. [30:23] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Very good. Council, any items you'd like to pull for further discussion from the consent agenda? [30:31] **Councilmember Joshua Lee:** Not pull, but just I wanted to give staff a shout out for item 6J in terms of finding funds to ensure that all of our service windows have ADA-accessible windows. I thought that was a good initiative and a well-needed item to have in City Hall. So I just appreciate their time and effort there. [30:57] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Good. Okay. With that, I'll take a motion to approve the consent agenda. [31:02] **Councilmember Dan Wolter:** I move to approve the consent agenda. [31:05] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Is there a second? [31:07] **Councilmember John Bermel:** Second. [31:08] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Any further discussion? All in favor say aye. (Aye). Consent agenda passes. We'll move on to item seven, public hearing for Wellhead Protection Plan Part 2. Turn it over to our Public Works Director, Mr. Oehme. [31:33] **Public Works Director Paul Oehme:** Good evening. Right, good evening, Mayor, city council members. This is a public hearing that we'd like to have for the Wellhead Protection Plan. This has been about a three-year process to get to this point, so we're ready to submit to the Department of Health for final approval. So, um, what is that Wellhead Protection Plan? This is a plan that is required by the agencies that have municipal water systems. So it's basically supposed to—it helps protect human pollutants from entering the water system as much as we can. So, the Wellhead Protection Plan goes back to federal requirements, basically the Safe Water Drinking Act that was passed in 1986, and those rules trickle down to the state level into Wellhead Protection Rules and State Statutes. And then basically the Wellhead Protection Plan that the city drafts, it's broken out into two parts. So, a delineation of the Wellhead Protection Areas—those areas around the well that we want to make sure that are free from contaminants as much as we can—and then well aquifer and vulnerability assessments associated with those areas as well. So that part was completed, I think it was early 2023, and we moved on to Part 2 of the plan which is the Potential Source Water Inventory associated with the DWSMA areas—Drinking Water Supply Management Areas. So this is the information that we gather from all the state agencies and counties and other databases that put into this document as well. The Wellhead Protection Plan is again a 10-year document. The Department of Health can amend or require updates to the plan prior to 10 years if there's major changes associated, but typically it's a 10-year plan. And then the Department of Health—our current plan is running out in April, so this is why we're moving forward with this new plan. Wellhead Protection Part 1 again: so the city does have 18 municipal wells that feed our water treatment plant. We do have one emergency well. And then as you can see on this slide here, this is the areas around our wells that we want to make sure that we're doing our best to protect from contaminants getting into the aquifers. So the larger green area, that's the DWSMA areas—the Drinking Water Supply Management Area. That's the area that we really need to focus in on and protect as much as we can. And then the emergency response areas: those are the areas right around the well where potentially surface water can enter in the aquifer and get to that well within about a year. The Drinking Water Supply Management Plan: again, that encompasses this area throughout the city, but it does include areas outside of the city including Farmington. So we do, based upon the modeling we've completed, we do have some areas that are in vulnerable areas, which are more susceptible for surface contaminants to get into the wells. And it's basically based upon the soil conditions in this area. So the red areas, the high vulnerability areas, that's more of a sandy soil type situation; as in the yellow area, that's more clay and more impervious type of areas as well. So then we move on to Part 2: the database. This is a deep dive into trying to gather all the information that we can from state agencies, specifically the Department of Health. The county has databases on private wells and gas station underground storage tanks, septic systems, those type of things. So we try to inventory all that. We have created a database and we're updating that database as we get new information as well, and make sure that we have that information available as needed. And then again, identify potential contaminant sources and management and identify strategies to try to mitigate as much as we can contaminants getting into our groundwater. And that's the gist of the plan, is to try—you know, what can we do to try to limit as much of the surface contaminants from getting into our groundwater and impacting our drinking water. And then we do have a Wellhead Protection Evaluation Program that basically looks at our plan over time and if we need to adjust or something's not working out, if we need to improve on certain areas. You know, we review that plan on a regular basis just to make sure that we're doing the best we can to protect our groundwater. And then alternate water supply contingency strategies as well—that kind of relates back to our Comp Plan and our Groundwater Management Plan and how we are going to manage our water in an event that there is an emergency that takes place. So that's all part of this plan. So again, potential contaminant sources: majority of the contaminants are, you know, septic systems or wells that are direct conduits to our aquifer. So we want to make sure that, specifically like private wells, are maintained, and if they're not being used, that we'll incentivize private owners for capping those wells so that risk is decreased. And then also again, monitoring storage tanks, chemicals, and known hazardous chemicals within the community as well. And then also if an accident happens within the community—a traffic accident where there's a spill—we need to monitor that in the inventory as well. So based upon all the data that we've collected, this graph shows you what is in our DWSMA area. Majority of the potential contaminant sources would relate to wells, and then also fuel and chemical storage areas—those are mainly like gas stations and other facilities like that. Contaminant spills may be a hazardous spill that happened within the community in the past; just have a database associated with that. And then hazardous waste generators—that could be actually like dentist offices or medical office type of facilities as well, and we go down from there with septic systems and petroleum pipelines and natural gas lines as well. So again, our goal is to maintain or improve the current water quality within our community. Our strategies, our goals: you know, we're going to be working with Farmington on that little piece in Farmington that is in our DWSMA. So a portion of that area is developed currently, but a portion is still yet to develop, making sure that they're aware of that. Providing information to the public and promoting activities that protect groundwater sources—this is specifically we're going to partner with Dakota County on maybe going after grants for dollars for well sealing of private wells and then also septic systems as well. So there's some grant dollars out there that we might try to leverage, partner with Dakota County on that. City will continue to compile data on water supply observation wells and gather the data as much as we can, put that in our GIS system. And that's for future planning and future, you know, needs within the city. And just looking at different future development potentials or redevelopments in some of these areas. A lot of the wells that we have are fully developed, so there's very little redevelopment or new development that would take place in there. But we just want to make sure that we're monitoring that, you know, the zoning is consistent with our Wellhead Protection Plan and that that's being considered into future potential redevelopments if necessary. And then our Wellhead Protection Management Actions: again, we're going to be encouraging sealing of private wells. Again, we're going to be working with the county on that initiative. Maintaining our databases within the city. Encouraging proper operations and maintenance of septic systems and wells as well. There's some good flyers and information out there for private owners to how how to best maintain their wells, making sure that contaminants are far away from from the Wellhead itself. And then public education—we'll get some public education out on a consistent basis and then data collection as necessary. And with that, that's a quick synopsis of the Wellhead Protection Plan. The Wellhead Plan is out on the website currently, and if there's any questions, I would be happy to address them. [42:07] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Okay. Any questions? Joshua. [42:13] **Councilmember Joshua Lee:** Well, that was helpful. This to me is dense material trying to read it in the packet, so your explanations on everything is helpful. Um, couple questions. One about the piece that's in Farmington. I'm assuming then that means that those protection areas do not overlap. So all of those DWSMAs—I think is what you said, the drinking water supply area—there's another agency that determines that and they don't overlap based on city? [42:50] **Public Works Director Paul Oehme:** Well, they can. So I mean, Farmington's or Burnsville's wells could potentially overlap with our DWSMA and within our community too. So we need to work collaboratively with other agencies to make sure that their DWSMAs are being maintained to our standards too, and vice versa. So it's a partnership. And again, the DWSMAs are delineated or determined by modeling of the groundwater movements, and it's pretty intense how the engineers can determine exactly what the 10-year delineation is for any particular water getting on the surface, making into the aquifer, and potentially into our wells. [43:40] **Councilmember Joshua Lee:** So do we have sensors, or how do we detect contaminants? Are there things at each of our wells that detect contaminants coming in, or is that all done through the water treatment facility? [43:52] **Public Works Director Paul Oehme:** Well, we do take water samples at our wells, and then also we do take samples at our water treatment facility as well on a regular basis to make sure that we don't have any contaminants getting in there. And that's another requirement of the Department of Health to take so many samples every year to make sure that our water quality meets the state and federal standards. [44:17] **Councilmember Joshua Lee:** Finally, just to be clear, that 105 well number—those are private wells, right? [44:23] **Public Works Director Paul Oehme:** That's correct. Yeah, because we don't have that many wells. We—the city maintains 18 operating wells. We have one emergency well. 105 is private wells. And you know, they could be being used on a daily basis or not being used at all. And we want to make sure that property owners know the proper techniques and making sure how to maintain those wells if they're still using them. And if they're not, we want to talk to them about potentially capping them, and there might be some funds in the future to help provide that. [44:39] **Councilmember Joshua Lee:** Thank you. [44:40] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Yep. I believe this is a public hearing, right? So I will now open it up to the public if there's any comments on our 781-page Wellhead Part 2 document. All right, seeing none, I will take a motion to close the public hearing. [45:04] **Councilmember Dan Wolter:** So moved. [45:06] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Is there a second? [45:07] **Councilmember Joshua Lee:** Second. [45:08] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** All those in favor close the hearing say aye. (Aye). Thank Mr. Oehme. Thank you. [45:15] **Public Works Director Paul Oehme:** So we'll be sending this document to the Department of Health, they'll review it, and then in a future Council packet—maybe the consent item agenda—we'll have a approval at that time. [45:25] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Very good consideration. Thank you. 740 some pages, you didn't read the appendices? [45:30] **Public Works Director Paul Oehme:** No, the full one's 780. [45:32] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Okay. Moving on to Item B, the public hearing to vacate easement and consider final plat of Interstate Second Edition. And we have Chris Oig from Probe—or do we have a staff report first? Okay, have our Economic Development Director Tina Goodroad give us... oh, okay, Chris, you're gonna go first. Very good. [45:55] **Chris Oig:** I was uh, told to have about—keep it under a minute. So, I'm Chris Oig with Probe Engineering, representing Interstate Power Systems. In a nutshell, they service tractors and trailers, specialty trucks like dump trucks, garbage trucks, that kind of thing, large generators. And they are looking to expand their parking lot, which is what is driving the need for the plat, which is in turn driving the need for the vacation of the underlying easements which will be reestablished in their new appropriate locations based on the new plat. Any questions? I'm sure I'll be around. [46:33] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Okay. Very good. Yep. [46:34] **Community Development Director Tina Goodroad:** Mayor, members of the council. Um, I did have a couple of slides that will just reiterate what he said. But here is a picture of the location. It's just south of 205th Street and Highview. It's 21568 Highview Avenue. And as the gentleman mentioned, Interstate Lakeville Property LLC has applied for a preliminary plat. The easements that need to be vacated are over the two lots. So in order to combine this property into one lot, we need to go through this process and then remove these easements, and they'll be replaced with a new plat. And this just shows the configuration of where those new parking stalls would be located on that adjacent lot which will be combined into one. They'll have access from their existing business. The pavement—what you're not seeing on the screen, I didn't put all of the sheets in here—is different stormwater ponding areas that will be provided as well as landscaping. But this is a very straightforward item; meets all of our zoning requirements. They are finalizing some of the stormwater, so we will come back with a development contract that will be on a future consent agenda. But just to keep this rolling, decided to tie the final plat tonight with the public hearing for the vacation of the easements. And I stand for any questions. [47:56] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Any questions? All right, this is a public hearing, so I'll open it up if there's any public comments. Seeing none, I'll take a motion to close the public hearing. [48:08] **Councilmember Dan Wolter:** So moved. [48:09] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Is there a second? [48:10] **Councilmember John Bermel:** Second. [48:11] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** All in favor say aye. (Aye). Public hearing is closed. Very good. What else do we have to do? The action item okay for the approval, final plat. Any further discussion about this? Otherwise, I'll take a motion for... yep, Dan. [48:26] **Councilmember Dan Wolter:** I'll make the motion. Okay, I move that we approve the vacation of drainage and utility easements and approve the final plat of Interstate Second Edition. [48:37] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Okay, is there a second? [48:40] **Councilmember Joshua Lee:** Second. [48:41] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Any discussion on the motion to approve the plan? Okay, roll call please. **City Clerk Ann Orlofsky:** Michelle Volk? **Councilmember Michelle Volk:** Aye. **City Clerk Ann Orlofsky:** Luke Hellier? **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Aye. **City Clerk Ann Orlofsky:** John Bermel? **Councilmember John Bermel:** Aye. **City Clerk Ann Orlofsky:** Dan Wolter? **Councilmember Dan Wolter:** Aye. **City Clerk Ann Orlofsky:** Joshua Lee? **Councilmember Joshua Lee:** Aye. [49:05] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Very good, thank you. Moving to item C, Autumn Hill preliminary plat on behalf of—let's see, we have Bob Weager and then also Tina. Welcome, Bob. I assume you're Bob. [49:15] **Bob Weager:** Excuse me. I am. Welcome, Mayor, council members. Youngfield Homes is excited to propose their 54-unit townhome and one detached townhome project for the southeast quadrant of Dodd Boulevard and 185th Street. The plan includes a nice variety of rambler and lookout and full walkout type lots in conjunction with four floor plan options. After approvals, the intent is to complete site grading and infrastructure installation in one phase. And Steve Saber with Youngfield is also here tonight and will stand for any questions you may have. Thank you. [49:56] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Okay, very good. Miss Goodroad, welcome back. [49:57] **Community Development Director Tina Goodroad:** Thank you. All right, so just to highlight a few points from the staff report. Again, the property location is highlighted at the corner of 185th and Dodd. The property is zoned and guided—or this proposal is consistent with the underlying land use as well as the zoning of the RST-2 which allows townhomes as a permitted use. This is the layout. It's pretty straightforward. They do have access from the south as well as an additional access at 185th, and then there will be an access to the east when Kelano Third Edition develops. The grading plan does allow for a nice mixture of slab, lookout, and walkout lots. And then the landscaping plan does a good job of buffering particularly along 185th and along Dodd, as well as buffering between the two neighborhoods on the south side. They're also planning for a tree within every lot and then also providing foundation landscaping, rather than buffering, around each of the homes. The elevations—they have four different models. It does a nice job with the different types of textures for the siding as well as the stonework or brickwork, as well as the different rooflines to provide a lot of variety to the homes. So this sheet shows the Redwood and the McIver, both front and back, and then the River Birch and the Teak. The Planning Commission did hold a public hearing at their meeting on April 4th and there were no comments from the public during that public hearing. And then the Planning Commission did unanimously recommend approval, and I would stand for any questions. [51:53] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Any questions? Joshua. [51:56] **Councilmember Joshua Lee:** Um, just about landscape screening on Dodd and 185th. Is there a grade change there, too? It's a busy road in terms of noise, and I'm curious if there's an elevation change between the houses and the road. [52:12] **Community Development Director Tina Goodroad:** I haven't studied the elevation plan as detailed as Planning Manager Jensen has, but perhaps, Bob, you can describe the difference of the elevation. [52:23] **Bob Weager:** I did not include that. Oh, sure. Thank you. Along 185th from Dodd Boulevard, it's about a 3% plus grade going to the east, so you can see the grade falls off pretty dramatically. And not everybody can read contours, but all those lines along 185th, the little dash lines—that's two feet. So there's quite a bit of fall along there. So those row of twin homes will pretty much be lookouts or walkouts. So they're going to follow the grade. Along Dodd, there's less fall, but those are also lookouts. A full walkout will drop approximately 8 ft from garage to the backyard, and a lookout will drop 5 feet. Rough examples in the area. In the interior, you see less contours, so those will be a rambler-type lot. So there isn't an option—on many projects we've done in Lakeville along busy streets, you'll have less grade change so you can get a 2- or 3-foot berm in and then install vegetation on top and have a nice screening. This isn't the case with this type of grade drop on both streets. So we're relying on the vegetation for the screening in this project. And there's quite a bit of vegetation proposed; obviously, it's going to take some years for them to mature and grow together. So they're going to provide a visual screen, not so much on a sound barrier by any means, but the visual screen will be there. [54:19] **Councilmember Joshua Lee:** Gotcha. Thank you. [54:21] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** I don't know if this question came up in planning: why 54 attached and one [detached]? It's not going to change my mind, but I'm just like, is it just the space that you could fit one more on there? [54:33] **Bob Weager:** Okay, that's exactly it. [54:35] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Very good. Other questions? If not, I'll take a motion to approve. [54:43] **Councilmember Michelle Volk:** I move to approve a resolution approving the Autumn Hill preliminary plat. [54:49] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Is there a second? [54:50] **Councilmember John Bermel:** Second. [54:51] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Okay. Any further discussion? Seeing none, roll call please. **City Clerk Ann Orlofsky:** Michelle Volk? **Councilmember Michelle Volk:** Aye. **City Clerk Ann Orlofsky:** Luke Hellier? **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Aye. **City Clerk Ann Orlofsky:** John Bermel? **Councilmember John Bermel:** Aye. **City Clerk Ann Orlofsky:** Dan Wolter? **Councilmember Dan Wolter:** Aye. **City Clerk Ann Orlofsky:** Joshua Lee? **Councilmember Joshua Lee:** Aye. [55:10] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Very good, we're looking forward to it. Congratulations. Moving on to items eight and nine, unfinished and new business. I don't believe we have any tonight. Announcements: the next work session is back at Lakeville City Hall and for the first time in the new Lake Marion conference room. And our next regular city council meeting is back here on May 6th. And finally, the "Books with Friends" event, formerly One Book One Lakeville, is this Saturday night at the Lakeville Arts Center. You can find out more information on the website. With that, I'll take a motion to adjourn. [56:06] **Councilmember Dan Wolter:** So moved. [56:08] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Is there a second? [56:10] **Councilmember John Bermel:** Second. [56:11] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** All in favor say aye. (Aye). We adjourn. [Music]